how am I ever supposed to feel at home again?
when your eyes were like a fireplace - warming me, and lighting my way
my home is so far away now that you are gone
I was never anything to you, I understand that
you were never really much to me either, until you left

the house I live in is just bricks and mortar, torn away wallpaper
and numbed down memories of a childhood I can scarce remember
what is a house of stones and wood compared to a home
of warm flesh and eyes like the pools of water that only exist in my mind?
a home with arms that can hold you safe, not walls that keep you restrained

have you ever been told to simply "*******" and been left stranded somewhere?
or kicked out of a party at 3 am in the winter and forced to walk 7 miles
back to your house, all the while you're still a little drunk, staggering a little
left feeling like your feet are somewhere else because you're so cold and you didn't think
to bring a sweater. Or you didn't want to, because the only ones you have used to be his.

I lost my train of thought, that tends to happen when I think of you
when you walked away, it felt like being kicked out of the only place I felt I belonged
no wonder the concept of a stable home is so hard for me to comprehend
after the storm that you took in your stride and threw upon me, then left me with, alone.

stable? I don't know stable after knowing you. You were a hurricane of fiercest proportions
you were long limbs that wrapped me up a little too tight, and screamed at me
told me you were home, and I was yours. You were a home that left me house bound
to the point you stopped feeling like a home, until you apologised for everything
and now it's been a long time since I last spoke to you, not long enough, but too long
and you still feel like a home to me

Months later as I ponder over all
that you were right about,
and all that I was right about, too,
I can’t help but wonder how
two people
that were so right could be so wrong.

After shamelessly dissecting each waking moment
from the first time I saw you across that crowded restaurant
to our series of wrestling matches and late night talks regarding our pasts
and the future that awaited us,
to the last time I bitterly, with tear-filled eyes, shook your hand goodbye,
I’ve concluded that everything said
was of the utmost truth
(with a few exceptions, of course)
and that your love for me was more genuine than most.
So why is it that I am asking myself this question for the
hundredth time
as I sit on my balcony watching the sun rise to the tips of the
dead, filemot colored hills after another
sleepless night?

Maybe we were too right.
Like two pieces of a puzzle that fit too tightly to be a match
no matter how hard you try to squeeze them together.
One always overpowering the other.
And so back we’re thrown into the vast pile of pieces,
perhaps finding each other again,
but never truly fitting until we realize that
maybe we weren’t so right after all.

I was young when I learned to sing
to the rhythm of fists
flying through the air
like birds too angry
with the season to call.
I was young when I thought a tune
could drown the sounds
of my mother’s sobs
crashing through hallways
in tidal waves and monsoon misery.
I was young when I carved
songs in the wallpaper
and into my delicate skin.
I turned bruises into syncopated beats
and scars into major scales.
My stepfather hated music
but I was an ornery child,
and I sang of joyous things
just to see if his soul could dance,
but instead,
I got two left feet in swift kicks.
When I was was young I was afraid of sticks
because I thought my body was a drum
to be beaten and battered
to a punishing rhythm.
I was young when I learned
that the taste of blood on my lip
was merely the flicker before the intermission;
the finale would be a grand display
of pomp, punch, and unlucky circumstance.
My mother was a tone-deaf drunk
who never learned to sing.
She belted begging in B flat octaves
like it was the only note she knew.
She wept an ocean of sorrow
as I sang my S.O.S.
“God, save our sinking ship.”
“God, save our sinking souls.”
“God, save our sorry stepfather from himself.”
And when I thought to cry,
I sang my little heart out instead.
I sang of devil's meeting end,
and I sang of daughter's finding love,
and I sang of mother's finding
strength enough to leave,
and I sang to the happy families
that only existed in sitcoms,
because my stepfather hated music
but I hated him far more.